Full Moon

[afternoonjazz]

Yesterday, a couple co-workers and I went out to lunch and people were driving erratically and aggressively. It was enough to make one comment, “I wonder if it’s a full moon.” When we got back to work, a co-worker who did not come with us to lunch had heard about the bad drivers and made the same comment. For the record, it was not a full moon last night, nor the night before. I find it interesting that people jump to that as a possible reason for erratic behavior. We certainly have seen a correlation between crazy callers and full moons, which could account for my co-workers using the phrase, but I have heard many people drum up that phrase as a possible contributor to nutty behavior: whether it be singular or en masse. My experience with the world at large is that most people pay no attention to the moon's brightness nor proximity to the earth unless they are surfers, astronomers, or their religion/culture has lunar based holidays or ceremonies. And most people seem completely at ease not thinking about the universe at large. At most, we think about satellites and why they are not providing your t.v. dish with optimal resolution and we think about weather and global warming. Then for a good number of people to admit that a heavenly body could affect people's actions seems a bit ... unusual. It's an acknowledgement that we are not as in control of ourselves as we pretend, although most people seem to use the phrase in conjunction with OTHER people's behavior, not their own. I think most women are acutely aware of how their hormones can wrest control away from the mind when their levels are off. But even that is an ego-centric factor. My body, my mood, my hormones. Not the moon that's in orbit, up there, away from me, that doesn't really have anything to do with me because we have electricity to brighten up our homes and streets. I wish more people would take the time to reflect on our place in the universe, and while using this phrase might not correlate to such reflection, it is refreshing to think of people transcending their monotony and admitting that perhaps we are not as in control of our situations as we have been led to believe. *Please note, I do not believe in Providence, I believe in Free Will.

I should create a maxim that sums this up nicely. But what I'd really like is for people to take a deep breath when mundane issues bog them down, go to astronomy picture of the day by NASA, and think about how absolutely pointless making the bed is.